


Bend Until It Breaks

by LadyChi



Category: Bones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-06
Updated: 2011-11-06
Packaged: 2017-10-25 18:49:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/273574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyChi/pseuds/LadyChi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. What if Bones and Booth didn't make the call to stay Howard Eppes' execution?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bend Until It Breaks

It's not something they're proud of.

It's not something they talk about, but they both know -- they both know they bent. Maybe just an inch, but, like oak trees cracked at the base, it's a wound far more subtle and lethal than anyone would know.

Brennan patiently IDs the bodies. Methodically she brushes dirt away from them, catalogs, bags, studies, x-rays, then bags, labels, and sends them home. Home to families that will never get the satisfaction of pointing their finger in Howard Epps' face and saying "You took our daughter from us".

Booth goes to tell the families. It's always Booth. Always in black. Always staid. And she can tell, when he comes back to take her for afternoon pie ("you gotta eat, Bones. Jesus, it's like you're melting away") and they both pick at their food, that they went wrong. They swerved.

They finish with the last girl (Heather Namen. 18 years old. Swim team captain in D.C. on a road trip with her girl friends, got lost on the way back from the club, never seen again), send her home, and Booth invites her over for a night cap.

His apartment's dark, but the Scotch is good. It's the kind of whiskey that burns all the way down until it seeps into veins and warms from the inside out. Brennan's lips are tingling and her head is spinning when Booth finally speaks.

"We fucked up."

She inclines her head. "Yeah."

He considers the whiskey glass in front of him, turning the liquid this way and that. "We fucked up big time, Bones."

"We couldn't be certain at the time that our findings --"

"Bullshit."

She pours another finger of the liquid and stays silent because he is, of course, right.

"I just don't know how I'm going to handle it, Bones."

"Handle what?"

He shrugs. "You're going to think it's stupid."

"Booth."

"I don't know how I'm going to handle seeing those girls when it's all over, you know. At the pearly gates. And telling them that I chose to not let them tell their stories."

"Oh." She does find it stupid, and yet, at the same time, not. Because she is feeling the same way. "I understand. I feel a level of guilt I have not experienced before."

"It sucks." Booth squeezes the glass and it fractures in his hands -- exploding into shards. Brennan exclaims and reaches forward to help him, but he curses and waves her off. "Just... grab the damn bandaids from the bathroom, would ya Bones?"

She does, and then she invades his space, pushes him back to the sink, cleans his wounds and bandages his hand. He laughs. "Sorry, Bones. I'm... I'm a mess."

"This entropy is not good for us."

"What?"

"We cannot allow ourselves to get weighed down by this. We have admitted we made a mistake. We should... forgive ourselves and move on."

Booth hisses as she wraps the gauze particularly tight. "How do we do that?"

"We'll tell the truth from now on. Unflinching. Unswerving." She grabs her hand in his, the undamaged one, and squeezes it.

"You know what I think about when you say stuff like that?"

"What?"

"How blue your eyes are. And I wonder if Scotch tastes as good on you as tequila did."

Brennan reaches up, fingers his hair. "Booth, we can't."

"Nah. You're right. Too many mistakes already this month, right?"

Her heart breaks all over again. Jagged breaks, millions of pieces of something sharp flowing through her bloodstream. He wants her to admit he would be a mistake. That he wouldn't be worth it. She knows no other way to say it. She swallows.

"Right."


End file.
